


Winternight

by Sholio



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: F/M, Festivals, Holidays, mention of canon character death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-01
Updated: 2014-11-01
Packaged: 2018-02-23 11:40:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,273
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2546246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sholio/pseuds/Sholio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jane attends an Asgardian autumn festival. It's not quite what she was expecting. (Takes place after <i>Thor 2.</i>)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Winternight

**Author's Note:**

> When I asked for Halloween ficlet suggestions on LJ/DW, Juniperphoenix had a brilliant one: _What autumn/harvest/day of the dead/etc. traditions (if any) are observed in Asgard?_ Happy Halloween, everyone!

When Jane thought of Asgard, she always thought of light. It was there in her earliest memories of Thor: lightning, stars. And her first visit to the city had been wreathed in light, from the rainbow colors of the Bifrost, to the glitter of gold everywhere, to a funeral pyre and the thousands of lanterns bidding a beloved queen farewell.

But on the Festival of Winter Nights, Asgard _blazed._

Lamps filled the city streets and set all the windows aflame; lanterns hung from doorways and glittered off reflecting pools and canals. Not all the lanterns were tethered -- in particular, Jane couldn't help noticing swarms of colored lights like fireflies that floated around people, mostly children. She couldn't help stopping to catch one in her hand. It was a globe about the size of a marble, faintly warm to the touch, and when she let go, it zipped off to join the cloud swirling around the dreadlocked head of an Asgardian girl.

"Come," Thor said quietly, tugging her hand. "We are late; we will miss the opening of the ceremonies."

His subdued attitude stood in contrast to the festival atmosphere around them, though Jane noticed other people here and there in the crowd who were similarly quiet and sad -- an old man here, there two teenage girls holding hands whose resemblance clearly proclaimed them to be sisters. Thor had told her enough that she understood why. The Festival was in honor of those who had died. Thor had lost his mother in the past year. These, too, were the recent bereaved.

She wondered how common bereavement was among the Asgardians. She'd never thought to ask Thor about their demographics, but now she found herself noticing the relative ratio of adults to children, quite a lot higher than she would expect for a city of this size -- there weren't very many kids. Of course, that made sense for people who lived nearly forever. Their fertility must be low. Still, the city would be hip-deep in people if they didn't have a corresponding death rate. Population demographics, as a field, was so far from her areas of expertise as to be laughable; maybe when she got back, Bruce could help hook her up with some resources ...

"We're here," Thor whispered in her ear, and she turned her eyes forward.

It was the same great plaza facing the night-dark bay where they had gathered for Frigga's funeral. This was a far more cheerful crowd, however, laughing and singing, waving skewers of meat and honey-drenched pastries and cups of mead.

"Asgard, attend!" Odin's voice rang across the crowd, and they fell into a hushed, respectful silence. In the waiting hush, Thor and Jane climbed the steps to join Odin on a dais overlooking the water. Jane kept trying not to stumble over the long skirt of the gown Thor had helped her pick out.

Odin glanced at them and then turned his face away, as if something about the sight of them hurt him. Jane knew he'd never liked her. Well, it was mutual. She looked down at the crowd and tried not to feel terribly self-conscious. (Failed.)

The water's surface blazed with the light of ten thousand lamps. There were no shadows; even the stone beneath Jane's annoyingly impractical shoes was bathed in light. She had to squint her watering eyes against it.

She heard them before she saw them. The hoofbeats came up through her feet. She felt the shuddering behind her breastbone. As the vibration rose from a shiver in the air to an audible sound, the crowd -- still eerily without voice -- began to stamp a tattoo in time with the hoofbeats. The sound, the vibration, filled the air until it seemed to press on her. Jane started to move her own feet hesitantly, then glanced at Thor and saw that his feet remained still, his eyes straight ahead, so she did likewise. Odin was so still he might have been a statue.

Far across the light-silvered plain of water, something moved.

Jane strained her eyes until they watered, and slowly she made out a long string of riders galloping across the water, arrowing inward toward the land. Their mail glittered as if made of diamonds -- and perhaps it was. Some of them wore helmets; others let their hair flow long and free. There were hundreds of them, maybe thousands, and as far as Jane could tell, all were women.

When the hooves of the first rider's horse touched land, the stamping stopped instantly and the crowd parted to open a long aisle from the sea to the dais. 

Thor's hand tightened in Jane's. 

Curiosity finally overcame her desire not to break the silence, and she prodded his shoulder insistently until he obligingly tilted his head so that she could whisper as softly as possible, "Who are they?"

"The dísir," Thor murmured into her ear, his breath stirring her hair. "Dead female warriors who guard the great families of Asgard and will return if ever we have need of them. On this night each year, they walk among us and renew their kinship to the loved ones they left behind."

Then he fell quiet, and Jane did too, because she had seen who rode at the head of the procession. _You could have warned me,_ she thought as Frigga's white horse cantered to a stop at the foot of the dais.

The crowd fell back to make way for horse and rider. Behind Frigga, the procession of mail-clad warriors rode in from the sea, stopping one by one. They gathered until the plaza was filled with them and the crowd had to retreat away from the harbor into the side streets. The horses of the dísir blew and snorted like living horses, but their eyes were made of flame. The women were silent and stone-faced, for the most part, but here and there one of them turned her head to search the crowd. Jane saw one or two of the younger-looking ones smile.

Frigga dismounted in a clatter of armor. Gone were the long robes she'd worn when Jane had met her. While her retinue waited and the crowd maintained a respectful hush, she mounted the steps -- one clanking step at a time -- to the dais where Odin stood waiting for her. 

He bowed his head, refusing to meet her eyes.

"Rise, my king," she said quietly in her even, measured voice, and he reluctantly looked at her, but she was no longer looking at him. Her gaze swept over Thor and Jane, lingering affectionately on each of them, then returning to Thor. "Oh child," she said. "You know death is only a translation, not an ending. I raised you better than that."

"I know, Mother," Thor said, his voice calm, and it was only then that Jane realized he was crying. Tears glistened on his cheeks under the light of a thousand lamps and trickled into his beard.

Odin made a soft sound. An unkingly sound. Jane could not tell quite what it was. It seemed he'd tried to say something and then fell quiet. Frigga looked back at him with eyes as deep as forest pools, and unlike the shining points of her armor, her eyes reflecting no light at all. Very slightly, she smiled, and her lips parted as though she and her husband shared a secret known to no others.

Then she kissed him on the forehead, on each cheek, and finally, tenderly, on the lips. Her eyes were open the whole time, staring into his as if with challenge.

He returned the kiss with the air of one receiving punishment.

**Author's Note:**

> When I went poking around for information on Norse harvest festivals, I discovered that the last festival of the year, the one invoking the change of season from summer to winter, is associated with the dísir, female ghost-warriors. Given the events of Thor 2, how was I supposed to pass up something like _that?_
> 
> [Winter Nights on Wikipedia](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winter_Nights)
> 
> [Winter Nights or Vetrablot](http://christopherjosevans.wordpress.com/2011/10/16/winter-nights-or-vetrablot-winter-finding/)
> 
> [Winternights](http://valhalska.webs.com/theholidays.htm) (on a calendar of probably rather anachronistic Norse holidays; scroll down to October)
> 
> [The dísir](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D%C3%ADs)
> 
> I expect all the above information is unreliable (and technically Freya, not Frigga, is supposed to be the leader of the dísir), but it's Marvel's Asgard; historical accuracy is not a huge concern, after all.


End file.
